Many diagnostic or therapeutic activities require or are based on a precise optical capture of a surgical site or of another area by medical personnel. For this purpose, bright, non-reflecting lighting is a requirement. This applies for instance to invasive or micro-invasive operations with therapeutic and/or diagnostic aims, to dermatological examinations and to dental and orthodontic examinations and operations.
Because as a rule the room light or ambient light is not sufficient for optimal illumination, lamps are used that are referred to hereinafter as operating room lamps, regardless of their intended application site within an operating room or in another place. The present invention relates, however, to operating room lamps in particular that are foreseen for use within an operating room because specific problems arise there with particular frequency and in unusual ways and thus led to the present invention, and because advantages of the present invention assume special importance there.
Therefore the following discussion focuses in particular on the situation in the operating room.
For optimum lighting, one or more operating room lamps are manually directed to the surgical site before the procedure takes place. Readjustment is made as necessary during the operation. For this purpose a sterile grip is positioned on each operating room lamp.
In DE 198 11 984 A1 a signal transmission network is described to which video cameras, remote-controlled operation room lamps, and control devices are connected.
WO 2007/054367 A1 presents an operating room lighting system with several lamps each with a control device. The control devices of the lamps communicate with one another via data interfaces and data lines.
DE 42 01 934 A1 proposes the control system of a data processing system using hand gestures.
In DE 200 01 134 U1 an operating room system is described that includes a projection surface for projecting operational elements onto a projection surface and a detection device for recognizing the movement of a finger on the projection surface.
DE 10 2008 019 191 A1 describes an apparatus for uniform illumination of a surgical site. A video camera captures an image of the surgical site. Individual lighting elements of an operating room light are switched on in order to achieve uniform lighting.
In EP 1 728 482 A1 a self-adjusting operation lamp system is described. Rotation point motors are provided in joints of an arm of a movable holder of an operating room lamp. Images from a video camera are used to control or regulate the position of the lamp when the field of vision of the camera is restricted.
DE 198 45 028 A1 describes a magnetic resonance system that is controlled by gestures picked up by a video camera.
In DE 198 93 484 A1 an operating room lamp is presented with a miniature video camera installed in the hand grip of the lamp body. Image signals are transmitted along the arm of the operating room lamp.
In DE 20 2007 007 054 U1 a system with an operating room lamp and a video camera is described. Information on the selected color temperature of the operating room lamp is transmitted to the video camera for an automatic white balance.
US 2005/0232467 A1 describes a device for capturing a movement of an object, in particular a hand motion, by means of an inertial sensor and a video camera fastened to the inertial sensor to capture an image of the environment of the object.
In EP 1 408 443 A1 are described a method and a device for analyzing gestures of a person to control a media playback device by means of gesture recognition.
In WO 00/69354 A1 a controllable camera platform is described for applications in telemedicine. The controllable camera platform is intended to avoid collisions or contacts with medical equipment, operating room lamps, and medical personnel. In addition an algorithm is described for moving the camera when the view of the observed object is obstructed.
DE 1 097 382 describes an operating room lamp with a photoelectric control system to move the operating room light. For a displacement in one direction, two photocells are situated in the housing of the operating room lamps with magnifiers mounted downstream. An operator can control the operating room lamp with a light emitter that, for example, emits UV and/or modulated light. If the two photovoltaic cells receive different quantities of light from the light emitter, then a motor is controlled by the relay to feed the operating room lamp until both photovoltaic cells again receive equal quantities of light.
This operating room lamp has a series of disadvantages. One of these disadvantages consists for many applications in the fact that the light emitter must be operated manually.